Once in a while, as I’m winding down my weekly Whole Foods grocery shopping, I treat myself to one product from the beauty section. As part of my lifelong fascination with generic store brand versions of name brand products, I usually like to try something from 365 Everyday Value, Whole Foods’s house brand. So far, I’ve tried the fragrance-free shampoo and conditioner, gentle face cleanser, and glycerin soap bar. Today, I’m reviewing the Whole Foods Moisturizing Lotion,…

I’ve always loved leisurely browsing the aisles of a nice, brightly lit grocery store. One thing I hate about living in NYC is the grocery shopping experience. When I’m shopping in a nice grocery store, I feel on edge because it’s usually pretty crowded—either because of the sheer number of people, the limited square footage, or some combination thereof. In some stores, I also feel like I’m dodging store employees as they restock the shelves, and fellow shoppers who want…

Sometimes name brands are worth the extra cost (as we established in our last edition of “Save or Splurge?", the CVS-brand generic version of CeraVe moisturizing cream just wasn’t up to snuff). But other times, things are a bit less clear. I’ve been using Whole Foods' 365 Everyday Value Gentle Skin Cleanser over the past few months, and it’s hard to deny that the packaging is almost a direct duplicate of Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser’s design and color scheme…